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Published: June 25th 2017
Geo: -23.926, 31.4209
She-who-must-be-obeyed decided that we had gone far too long between safaris, and given that we hadn't yet visited the country (South Africa) that is home to one of the most famous national parks in the world (Kruger), it was time to figure out how to make that happen. At a size roughly the same as the entire country of Israel, Kruger is not to be taken lightly so we made arrangements for a guide to chauffeur the Princess and myself around for the days we were going to be there. Kruger is one of a number of parks in South Africa that allows, and almost encourages self-drives, but our past experience has been that the guides/trackers have an uncanny knack for spotting critters that we would have zipped right by (and after spotting a hapless couple jammed into a Fiat 500 trying to spot the herd of elephants that were about to squish their motorized tin can, we knew we made a good choice).
Our guide turned out to be Shoeless Simon who, as you might expect, never wears shoes in this land of snakes and scorpions. We never did get a good answer as to why he shunned
shoes but after some deep dives into his personal life we assumed it had something to do with any number of turbulent experiences he has had with South African women. Even DH wasn't able to offer up many solutions to his social life but we did decide that one of the challenges he may have was a distinct passion for birds- he recognized that we were here to see the Big 5 but he was able to fill in any dry spells with the smorgasbord of birds on offer in Kruger. His enthusiasm for feathers was contagious and pretty soon I was waiting for the lions to move so I could get a decent shot of the Lilac-Breasted Roller. Any of the encounters with the Big 5 was breathtaking and magical but my most memorable sighting might have been the chase and attack of an African Fish Eagle on a full grown Blue Heron who was then rescued from imminent death by an angry Egyptian Goose- all while hovering just over a massive snoozing crocodile- you just don't see things like that every day (although the attempted take-down of an Impala by a charging Cheetah was another jaw-dropping experience, and
any time with lions or elephants is time well spent).
Simon was also in charge of the meal preparation while we explored Kruger, and assuming he finds a woman who's as passionate about birds as he is, he may need to expand his menu a little bit in order to keep her hooked. Everything from pancakes to pasta was cooked on the Braii (the South African version of a BBQ-like device) but the overriding ingredient was meat and copious amounts of unidentified meat at that- not since our time in Argentina had we seen such dedicated carnivore spreads. As we checked out the neighbours, it was readily apparent that Simon was not alone in his meat fixation- for hours on end, very large SA men would jealously guard the area around the Braii presumably just in case a vegetable should make appearance (although potatoes were deemed to be acceptable intruders). I didn't actually see any of them peeing on the perimeter of their territory but the Braii is not simply a cooking event, it is a validation of SA manhood.
We really enjoyed Kruger- it gets shunned by some of the more serious safari types (often in favour of the private
reserves adjacent to Kruger) because you are required to stay on the roads and it can be overgrown at certain times of the year. We're saving the leopard for our next stop in Sabi Sands but outside of that (and the ever-elusive African Wild Dog) we saw pretty much everything we had hoped to see and a whole lot more. DH gave me another failing grade for self-discipline with respect to my photography (although to be fair there were numerous other more heavily armed camera types that were taking far more photos than I was) and is forcing me to buy dinner for anyone who is able to make it through all of the many photos I'm attaching to this entry. I'll be more selective on the next post (maybe) but we're heading into another internet dry spell so for now everything is getting uploaded.
'sien jou later'
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Leigh Boddy
non-member comment
Lovely photos. Nice to see some photos taken not too too far from our old stomping ground.